Flight to Arras
New York, Reynal & Hitchcock, [February] 1942.
1 vol. (140 x 210 mm) of 255 p. and 1 f. Cardboard and illustrated dust jacket from the publisher, slipcase.
First edition – it was published before the French one.
Presentation copy, inscribed: “For Mrs. Clayburg, to whom I want to prove that I indeed write English very well. And as a respectful tribute. Antoine de Saint Exupéry”.
The copy was then offered by the dedicatee: “To Adair (My favorite pilot) – A souvenir of another great flyer and human being. Alma [Clayburgh [the h underlined!] Grew.”
We apologize for the imperfect translation generated by Deepl for the purposes of the show.
In January 1941, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry decided to leave occupied France for good and settle in New York. He worked on the final lines of Flight to Arras, began Citadelle and a ”children’s story” which he finally decided to illustrate himself, unconvinced by the overly elaborate drawings of his friend Bernard Lamotte – the one who had done those for Wind, Sand and Stars [Terres des hommes] nor by those he was providing him with for Flight to Arras, in which he wanted to salute the courage and strength of the young pilots: Gavoille obviously, but also Sagon, Pénicot, Dutertre, Hochedé, Commander Alias and Lieutenant Israël. With this text, he attempted to explain the situation in France, its capitulation, to the Americans in order to encourage the United States to enter the war.
The text appeared in pre-original form, in English, in January 1942 in the magazine Atlantic Monthly, then in volume the following month: it was a bestseller, and Saint-Exupéry’s voice seemed to be heard. John Barbeen declared: “The critics do more than praise the writer’s talent. They are spreading the idea in the press of a deep France, different from the “staff in perpetual retreat” […] They make one feel the absurdity of flying, pursued by the German fighter force, when it has not been possible, in nine months, to obtain planes resistant to the cold of the upper layers of the atmosphere”, he wrote in The Chicago Herald on March 29, 1942. The work would be a best seller for six months: “this book is a great and beautiful book, perhaps the true book of the 1939 war” wrote Pierre Mac Orlan in the newspaper Les Nouveaux Temps on January 8, 1943.
Antoine and Consuelo de Saint-Exupéry moved into Greta Garbo’s apartment at Beeckman Place in New York at the end of 1942, where they entertained the elite of New York society. It was probably during one of these evenings that the copy was offered to Alma Clayburgh, a famous opera singer, Francophile and patron of the arts. The copy was then bequeathed to her daughter, Alma Eveline Clayburgh-Grew: the latter had married James Hooper Grew in June 1938, who was then teaching French at the famous Philips Academy in Andover, north of Boston. The couple, assiduously Francophone, also frequented the literary circle of exiled writers on the East Coast.
Alma Clayburg-Grew, indeed many years later, in memory of Saint-Exupéry, finally offered the copy to a certain Adair, her “favorite pilot”. In his signature, he emphasized the letter that the author of The Little Prince had forgotten in his mother’s name, which proved that he could indeed write English, but be less attentive to the spelling of his guests’ surnames!
